Tweet
When people stoop to low-blow ignorant propaganda tactics like this, it means their candidate of choice has nothing better to offer. Houston Comptroller Annise Parker did well on election night in the mayors race, earning her a seat in a run off against Gene Locke (polls now have her leading 47-34).
So with a lead like that, the gloves come off, and boy did they. Local wingnut Dave Wilson sent out a postcard to 35,000 people featuring a photo of Parker and her partner, declaring, “Is this the image Houston wants to portray?” and takes the “oh, so sorry you are a homosexual and need to be free from it” tack:
“I have nothing but compassion, respect and sensitivity towards those trapped in homosexual behavior. I have family members and friends who have been ensnared in this behavior, and I know something of the incredible pain and sorrow it has brought to them and their families. With God’s grace, I carefully balance this love and respect for these individuals with warnings about the promotion and demand for legal and political approval for homosexual behavior that will stifle religious freedom and trap millions of more people in its deadly grip. Therefore, I would ask you to vote against Annise Parker for Mayor.“
But the lunacy doesn’t stop there. The other reason that Dave Wilson needed to send a reminder about Parker’s lesbianism is that, apparently, if you’re gay and elected to office, you will help in the extinction of the human race. I’m not sh*tting you.
Dave Wilson, an electrician who has spent years pestering incumbent politicians of both parties, has turned his sights on Houston Controller Annise Parker. He says that Parker should not be mayor because ‘homosexual behavior leads to extinction.’ Wilson says he is mailing the fliers to 35,000 Houston voters who cast ballots both in the November mayoral election and in the 2008 Republican presidential primary. ‘I’d like to energize the conservative Christian base in Houston, and get them to vote,’ he said…’I don’t see a good family, a Christian family, one man, one woman,’ Wilson said. ‘It’s a picture of her and her mate being sworn in in public and that’s the image I have a problem with.’ 11 News asked Wilson what he believes is wrong with the city having an openly gay mayor. ‘The openly gay lifestyle leads to extinction,’ he said. ‘You can’t reproduce.’”
I’m sorry, but is Wilson saying that hopefully-soon-to-be-mayor Annise Parker is going to outlaw sexual intercourse and artificial insemination? How exactly is her election going to stop reproduction?
I’m so tired f reality-challenged excuses “gays-cause the-end-of-the-world” horsesh*t like this. What’s sad is the number of sheeple who believe people like Wilson. The critical thinking skills of too many American voters are nonexistent, and even worse, celebrated by the religious extremists, teabaggers, who court the know-nothing vote. It’s sad.
Houston, show us that you’re a reality-based city in the Lone Star State looking toward the future and selecting your mayor on their qualifications to do the job. Toss that postcard into the recycling bin.
Hat tip, Andy @ Towleroad.
14 Comments
I wish a retaliation postcard could be usedHave Parker standing next to three different male partners.
One Black, one Latino, and one Hassidic Jew.
caption it
same hate different century
When is Dave Wilson going to escape his idiotic lifestyle?This Dave Wilson character thinks that gays and lesbians are trapped in homosexual behavior, but he doesn’t realize that he is trapped inside his own ignorance.
really sad…I live in Houston, and it makes me sick to see this bigoted crap.
This so-called Christian is a 62 year old homophobe that helped ban same-sex benefits for city workers in 2001. He obviously thinks the same kind of hate-filled scaremongering is going to work in 2009. Sadly, he’s mistaken. 95% of the comments on the Houston Chronicle condemn this idiot.
Annise will win in the run-offAll of these haters don’t even live in the city of Houston, so no worries, ya’ll.
Annise Parker has been a councilwoman and now controller for twenty years and I have had dinner with her. She has been with her partner around twenty years and they have adopted kids together (if that’s not pro-life, I don’t know what is) which kind of screws with their reproduction argument, since she took their unwanted offspring off their hands.
Twenty years ago, our district was a craphole (I lived in it) that was rehabbed by gays and has now quintupled in real-estate prices along with all the neighboring districts that were so unsafe that if you drove drown the wrong street, you would lose your car. Annise being in office was an important part of revitalizing Houston, and gays are absolutely critical to the culture and economy of Houston.
I can’t think of another person who has given her entire life over to the city of Houston. She was the fiscal rear-guard during the aftermath of the last hurricane–which was handled efficiently versus the disasters that were Katrina and Rita–and the city has not suffered much from the recession.
These mud-slangers cannot touch her. I always knew she would be mayor and she is going to make a damn fine one. Even Republicans who have lived in or close to our districts (like Poppy and Barbara) will vote for her.
Texas is an embarrassment, but Houston has never let me down.
So gayness leads to extinctionbecause, allegedly, we can’t reproduce? Fine. Has Wilson also targeted the Catholic clergy and their involvement in politics? After all, celibates can’t reproduce either. If it’s okay for them, it has to be okay for us too. And vice versa.
Because no one really wants to be heteroI have a good laugh every time I hear some homophobe claiming that if homosexuality is accepted as normal, then that will lead to the extinction of the human race.
They appear to be working from the assumption that given the chance, every single person in the world would be gay. Now why would they think that? Is that what they would do? LOL
We need less reproduction.Overpopulation, limited resources, anyone? I realize the fundnuts don’t care about the world they leave to their children and grandchildren because they expect to get raptured tomorrow, but some of us do care. If humans are in danger of extinction, it’s because we are killing the planet that sustains us, not because we don’t make enough new people.
I’ll say it againThe existence of mules certainly hasn’t caused the extinction of asses.
The Image Houston actually portrays…The image of a gay high school student being beating with a steel pipe after stepping off the school bus.
That’s the image I noted it for just today.
..you forgot the Muslim! and the Jap, and Chink, and Wop and Okie!!!
Be niceI’m an Okie.
I was wondering….When Hotze’s Nazis and the rest of the Houston homohaters were going to come out of the closet
All the ranting by the Forces of Intolerance is going to accomplish at this point is motivate people to actually come out on December 12 and vote for Annise like they’ve done in six previous civic elections.
And they’ll be crying in January when Annise is taking the oath of office in the Wortham Center again.
Other messages: Uppity Women Don’t Know Their Place, and What’s That Black Woman Doing There…I would guess that Wilson thinks that Parker’s lesbian status is a bonus because it helps him connect with those men who resent uppity women who dare to lead instead of mutely serving (Christian or otherwise) men like themselves. Using the all-woman photograph, he can get a segment of non-churchgoing men riled in addition to the less numerous churchgoing men, and by writing about “homosexual behavior” in the small print, he can avoid offending conservative evangelical women. Not to mention, he gets another white-racist bonus from the photo, because there is a black woman judge administering the oath of office.
Many conservative evangelical women are conflicted about the womanly submission issue, and in the classic radio-preacher trope, “struggle with the spirit of feminism” (aka assertiveness). Some of these women will speak the conservative evangelical line about submission, but also work, and strive for better pay and better jobs (or any jobs, at this point). These women aren’t too likely to welcome a call to defeat a woman politician on the the grounds of being female.
makes me wonder what God thinks of all the lies being told in his name….